January 03, 2007

Since it can safely be assumed that millions are now in possession of copies of "Cars" and "Six Feet Under: The Complete Season," this is the perfect opportunity to trade in or up for other, less obvious DVDs or sets you really want -- or in some cases, need.

My personal want list, fulfilled this year, begins with the best limited TV series ever made, "Brideshead Revisited," adapted from Evelyn Waugh's novel and originally shown here on PBS in 1982.

All 660 minutes of the drama -- about the life-altering friendship of would-be painter Charles Ryder (Jeremy Irons) and Oxford classmate Lord Sebastian Flyte (Anthony Edwards), who introduces him to a world he would have never known when he takes Charles home to meet his his family and his upper crust London crowd -- have been remastered for the "25th Anniversary Edition Collector's Edition" (FOUR STARS out of four stars, Acorn Media, $59.99).

The perfect cast includes Sirs Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud, and as Sebastian's sisters, Diana Quick and Phoebe Nichols (sic), for whom I developed life-long crushes.

Or maybe I am alone; it would stand to reason that if you truly have a life-long crush on the Phoenician, you'd be able to spell her last name correctly. It's not like the first "l" in her last name is silent.

Long live the splendor and glory of Ms. Nicholls against the depradations of the infidel !!! Kobe Akbar !!!